Housing

[Vladimir]

so how do you guys feel about player housing? Housing can be a great tool that allows you and your guild meeting place. Also housing is great for people who like to do decorating stuff. and if you clustered a few houses together then they would become sort of like a city.

[hanstin]

so how do you guys feel about player housing? Housing can be a great tool that allows you and your guild meeting place. Also housing is great for people who like to do decorating stuff.

could be cool if it was Guild only shows power and longlivety etc

and if you clustered a few houses togheter then they would become sort of like a city

go easy on the sims k

[Vladimir]

go easy on the sims k


NEVER!!!

[Moloch]

All we know right now is “There will be housing and “multiple sizes of guild accommodations”” (Loren, FP 1 Apr 06)

[Dooberoo]

Housing is cool, in EQ2 I made furniture, had rat pets, and showed off my trophies.

[Mister Matt]

ive never played an mmo before so i dont know how this works, but how would there be like 2 million houses in a game?

[hanstin]

ive never played an mmo before so i dont know how this works, but how would there be like 2 million houses in a game?

there will be seperate servers IF a server can handle 2 milion players in the same realm then we also got a robot who can fly us to our work ETC (and do our work)

[Stiler]

One thing I hope for housing is that it's not instanced.

IMO instanced housing ruins a great deal of the community aspect and immersion. This is one of the main reasons why in games such as Anarchy online and EQ2 hardly anyone cares/uses their houses really.

Ultima online and SWG got housing the best imo, non-instanced and plenty of ways to decorate it, etc to your liking.

Now there were a few problems I admit. First was the over-crowding aspect. You'd have quite a few houses dotting around the landscape that look out of place and such.

One thing that would help this is if the developers made certain plots of lands buildable upon and others not, so they can regulate where houses will be built/not built. Another aspect is limiting it to like one-house per character or such, so you don' thave one person with 5 buildings that they really hardly ever use all of them and just take up lots of space.

[hanstin]

One thing I hope for housing is that it's not instanced.

IMO instanced housing ruins a great deal of the community aspect and immersion. This is one of the main reasons why in games such as Anarchy online and EQ2 hardly anyone cares/uses their houses really.

Ultima online and SWG got housing the best imo, non-instanced and plenty of ways to decorate it, etc to your liking.

Now there were a few problems I admit. First was the over-crowding aspect. You'd have quite a few houses dotting around the landscape that look out of place and such.

One thing that would help this is if the developers made certain plots of lands buildable upon and others not, so they can regulate where houses will be built/not built. Another aspect is limiting it to like one-house per character or such, so you don' thave one person with 5 buildings that they really hardly ever use all of them and just take up lots of space.




then i did like to have my big ass house in the midle of nowhere/ near dark and dangerous crap. so nobody will find my hide out ;)

[Mister Matt]

maybe we already get to do this in other mmo's but what if we could choose where to build our house like out in the remote wilderness or something? I think that would so awesome.

[a chewy rock]

Anything can happen if you're rich, right? I hope so, because I would have a house that floats over the town without toilets, but instead it would have a room with a big whole that stares down at the citizens of the town below. I'll let you guys think up the rest.

Coolest house ever.

[jiisu]

Let me chime in here since none of the other devs have made a statement.

We currently have only planned for having instanced housing at this time. We are currently focusing our energies on the more important focuses of the game which involve how you play. When the time comes to focus on features such as housing, we will be more forthcoming with the information... maybe. :-p

Have no fear, housing will not turn into a loathed after thought.

[Stiler]

ah instances? :(, no one will ever just randomly wonder by or anything then, feels disconnected from the main game world and out of place imo.

Houses if done correctly add a great social aspect to the game that usually is lacking with instanced based housing.

[MadLordOfMilk]

Instanced housing is pretty much the most logical route to go... until someone comes up with a good system for non-instanced housing that is. SWG's housing system worked fine at first... but if someone quit the game, the house was stuck there forever taking up that space, and it caused all kinds of problems with server mergers. The only real way to figure out the best possible method is to experiment and change the rules around as you go, then completely start over with the information you've learned so that the remnants of the old shoddy system are gone... and unfortunately, the idea of wiping something in an MMO isn't all that widely accepted ;D.

[Moloch]

Limited housing sites work if housing that can be sieged, destroyed and/or taken over. Gives PvP a focus, or it could even be done through competitive PvE mechanics

[jiisu]

Everyone on this team is a fan of the word seige, Moloch. You should know by now. :-p

[neuvena]

Maybe something would work along the lines of instanced towns rather than instanced individual homes.

[jiisu]

Maybe something would work along the lines of instanced towns rather than instanced individual homes.



Well how are you supposed to seige an town if its insta..... er.... nevermind.

[neuvena]

Maybe something would work along the lines of instanced towns rather than instanced individual homes.



Well how are you supposed to seige an town if its insta..... er.... nevermind.


I guess I kind of more ment making each town a sepeate area which is seperate from the main map that you would have to load into. Towns could be open to anyone though. That way housing wouldn't clutter the main map. I guess it would still be considered an instance. For raids the opposing faction could just load into the area and battle. IDK just a thought.

[hanstin]

Maybe something would work along the lines of instanced towns rather than instanced individual homes.



Well how are you supposed to seige an town if its insta..... er.... nevermind.

well when you close your eyes and lie down on this thing called "bed" you start what people say dreaming with dreams you can do ANYTHING (i realy mean ANYTHING). in your dreams you can siege towns then :D

[jiisu]

I'm going to continue that post down here...


;)

[neuvena]

I'm going to continue that post down here...


;)


?

[jiisu]

Huh... apparently this attempt at teasing has failed miserably. Let me be forthcoming. I might be hinting at the fact that if we have towns, the may not be instanced and will most definitely be open to seige by their enemies... but it's all up to interpretation. :p

[neuvena]

lol gotcha ;) Sometimes I just need stuff spelled out for me.

[Moloch]

Everyone on this team is a fan of the word seige, Moloch. You should know by now. :-p


All it takes for bears to triumph is for one PvPer to remain quiet.

if we have towns, the may not be instanced and will most definitely be open to seige by their enemies

And all is right with the world ;)

[hanstin]

and will most definitely be open to seige by their enemies... but it's all up to interpretation. :p

Hello lord of the rings part 4 the hidden story sauron returns :P srry just had to SIEGING TOWNS FTW

[Mister Matt]

what do "FTW" and "BTW" mean?

[hanstin]

what do "FTW" and "BTW" mean?

FTW= For the win
BTW = by the way

[jiisu]

Learn somethin new everyday! =D

[hanstin]

Learn somethin new everyday! =D

hehe word ;)

[Darthorious]

Well playing SWG for so long I can tell you instanced housing will save huge headaches down the road and here's why if no one knows already...

At one point we had a city practicly on top of the krayt graveyard and the krayts stopped spawning because of it and became almost extinct in game. These were needed by toons for loot that could not be obtained any other way.

After all the cancelations in SWG over the past, almost 2 years now, tons of empty housing sitting everywhere cluttering up the game even though houses take decay they don't destroy themselves and developers are at a loss of what to do because their afraid they might destroy houses/cities/guilds on accident that currently are player maintained.

On top of that even if they did destroy them turns out there is a bug that will not let you place the house where an old one was because the game still thinks there is a house there even though you can plainly see there is not. Only way around the bug is to have the owner of the old house place a house down somewhere else on the planet so it still does no good in the long run.

Because of above there is no room to create new cities on most if not all planets because they had smartly placed a cap on the number allowed per planet. But once cap reached no new cities and the lower level cities can't advance up in rank because of it either.

So even though it is cool to have a real house in game in realtime if not properly thought out it will become a disaster down the road so ya instanced is the only way to go IMO. Unless when a account was cancelled all items the player owned and placed in the world were destroyed. And the land was re-released so a player could build back upon it.

[hanstin]

Well playing SWG for so long I can tell you instanced housing will save huge headaches down the road and here's why if no one knows already...

At one point we had a city practicly on top of the krayt graveyard and the krayts stopped spawning because of it and became almost extinct in game. These were needed by toons for loot that could not be obtained any other way.

After all the cancelations in SWG over the past, almost 2 years now, tons of empty housing sitting everywhere cluttering up the game even though houses take decay they don't destroy themselves and developers are at a loss of what to do because their afraid they might destroy houses/cities/guilds on accident that currently are player maintained.

On top of that even if they did destroy them turns out there is a bug that will not let you place the house where an old one was because the game still thinks there is a house there even though you can plainly see there is not. Only way around the bug is to have the owner of the old house place a house down somewhere else on the planet so it still does no good in the long run.

Because of above there is no room to create new cities on most if not all planets because they had smartly placed a cap on the number allowed per planet. But once cap reached no new cities and the lower level cities can't advance up in rank because of it either.

So even though it is cool to have a real house in game in realtime if not properly thought out it will become a disaster down the road so ya instanced is the only way to go IMO. Unless when a account was cancelled all items the player owned and placed in the world were destroyed. And the land was re-released so a player could build back upon it.

TLDR j/k

well how about you put all the houses in 1 "instance" and we can siege there without mobs spawning or affecting the real kaos war world?

[neuvena]

Well playing SWG for so long I can tell you instanced housing will save huge headaches down the road and here's why if no one knows already...

At one point we had a city practicly on top of the krayt graveyard and the krayts stopped spawning because of it and became almost extinct in game. These were needed by toons for loot that could not be obtained any other way.

After all the cancelations in SWG over the past, almost 2 years now, tons of empty housing sitting everywhere cluttering up the game even though houses take decay they don't destroy themselves and developers are at a loss of what to do because their afraid they might destroy houses/cities/guilds on accident that currently are player maintained.

On top of that even if they did destroy them turns out there is a bug that will not let you place the house where an old one was because the game still thinks there is a house there even though you can plainly see there is not. Only way around the bug is to have the owner of the old house place a house down somewhere else on the planet so it still does no good in the long run.

Because of above there is no room to create new cities on most if not all planets because they had smartly placed a cap on the number allowed per planet. But once cap reached no new cities and the lower level cities can't advance up in rank because of it either.

So even though it is cool to have a real house in game in realtime if not properly thought out it will become a disaster down the road so ya instanced is the only way to go IMO. Unless when a account was cancelled all items the player owned and placed in the world were destroyed. And the land was re-released so a player could build back upon it.

TLDR j/k

well how about you put all the houses in 1 "instance" and we can siege there without mobs spawning or affecting the real kaos war world?

Thats kinda what I was saying

[hanstin]

well you said it so great that i had to say it again

truth: dident read your already said it

[Stiler]

or...you could keep non-instanced housing but:

1. Make only select plots of land "buildable" upon (IE so the world/places don't get cluttered with houses where they look out of place or mess up anything).

2. Have limited housing tied based on accounts (IE so one guy can't have 10 houses when he only really uses one).

3. Have decay that eventually destroys the house if they are left unattended to for so long.....and actually destroy them to the point nothing is there and another player can build their house there :p.

4. Make houses something that's not cheap but a bit expensive enough that it will take a little bit of time to save up for.



SWG woulda been fine if they did that imo, most of their problems are because of people have more then one house and houses in general were fairly cheap (the small'ish ones) and the decay problems as mentioned because people could basically build their homes anywhere.

[neuvena]

or...you could keep non-instanced housing but:

1. Make only select plots of land "buildable" upon (IE so the world/places don't get cluttered with houses where they look out of place or mess up anything).

2. Have limited housing tied based on accounts (IE so one guy can't have 10 houses when he only really uses one).

3. Have decay that eventually destroys the house if they are left unattended to for so long.....and actually destroy them to the point nothing is there and another player can build their house there :p.

4. Make houses something that's not cheap but a bit expensive enough that it will take a little bit of time to save up for.



SWG woulda been fine if they did that imo, most of their problems are because of people have more then one house and houses in general were fairly cheap (the small'ish ones) and the decay problems as mentioned because people could basically build their homes anywhere.


SWG was fine when the game first came out.

1. Thats why you can't build on all planets and even the planets you can build on you still can't build too close to major cities and on all terrains.

2. Thats why there is lots. Larger houses cost more lots but can hold more items. Because most people where using houses for storage but still had multiple houses they uped the amount of items a house can hold.

3. Exactly what SWG has in place except for bug that was metioned earlier.

4. When the game first came out keeping maintenance even in a small house was hard. Now the economy in game is just so far out of wack that its easy to throw 30k into a small house and not have to worry about it for a few months.

Yet now SWG still has problems with old houses cluttering the map.

[jiisu]

We are working on a way to perfectly implement the housing feature of the game. Instance based housing may not be the only means of getting a house.

[neuvena]

Don't get me wrong. I'm all for non-instance based housing. I'm just trying to point out some problems and things that should have worked theoreticly that I've seen so that the same problem doesn't occur in KW.

[jiisu]

We have a unique opporitunity since we get to see how these other developers planned for housing and why their systems flourished or failed. This information is vital to everyone including housing in their title. Other games were our dry runs, this will be the real thing. ;)

[neuvena]

Jiisu, you're so optimistic. It's awsome ;D

[Lorens_Gurl21]

Jiisu, you're so optimistic. It's awsome ;D


Haha! You're an optimistic Bam Margera. ;D LOL.

[hanstin]

Jiisu, you're so optimistic. It's awsome ;D


Haha! You're an optimistic Bam Margera. ;D LOL.

How the hell does he look like bam margera?

[convict]

Id like to see housing and towns done like SWG but.. If your account is canceled, your house gets packed up and put in your inventory.

To keep people from building in areas like the person above posted, the Krayt area, make certain places that you cannot build or place a house. If you go the instanced route, like EQ2, then I wouldnt even bother coding houses in and use that time elsewhere.

[Lorens_Gurl21]

Jiisu, you're so optimistic. It's awsome ;D


Haha! You're an optimistic Bam Margera. ;D LOL.

How the hell does he look like bam margera?


*rolls eyes* Just let it go.

[jiisu]

I think he's just jealous. :-p

[Lorens_Gurl21]

I think he's just jealous. :-p


You're probably right. ;D I would be if I were him.

[jiisu]

I'm not spillin beans for flattery. ;) :P

[Lorens_Gurl21]

I'm not spillin beans for flattery. ;) :P


I wouldn't really ask you to spill the beans anyways. I like the suspense too much. ;D

[hanstin]

I think he's just jealous. :-p

OFC i am jealous ur so great ur teh ub0r

(not realy) i just dont see a comperison between you and him but maybe im blind >.<

[Will]

First off, if you haven't read the FAQ, go check it out! Lots of new cool stuff in there, especially on housing.

If you haven't, you're in luck, because I'm about to tell you some cool new stuff! I'll walk you through our thought process, and how we came to some of the decisions, and why I personally think it will work out wonderfully.

So we encountered the question behind it all, how do we give everyone what they want, but preserve the feeling of having something unique if you have the chance to get it? We realized that there were plenty of solutions, and rattled them off one by one, nodding and eventually shaking our heads in disapproval. We realized we were being silly and restrictive. We should be revolutionary, and innovative, and not cling to old ideas. Why have one solution? Let's have 3!

So what we came up with was a 3-tiered solution, that offers something for everyone, and will really improve on the "city" feeling of being in a major city.

Our instanced housing will be in Apartments. You'll buy a room, with as many different options as we want, and you'll be placed into the apartment on a certain floor, with a certain room number. The lobby entrance, and possibly each floor will be their own instances. It will be "instanced", but it will have everyone inside. You'll know who your neighbors are, and you'll know who else lives in your apartment. That's how it should be! You can walk next door and see your neighbors, and you can actually see who lives where. But it's still instanced, and it's still available to everyone (Although not for free, obviously)

Our second solution is a lot purchasing system. Let's say you've had an apartment for a while, but you've really been trucking along and you've made quite the name for yourself. It's time for you to move on up. So, you go check out the lots available in and around Sanctuary. You finally settle on a nice room with a good view and purchase the lot, and place whatever house or feature you'd like on it. Maybe you want a store? Maybe you want a fountain? Cool by us, just pay the fees and it's yours.

With this method a guild can pool it's money and locate itself together in an area, and place whatever they want. Likewise, you and your friends can build houses next to one another if you find adjacent lots. We felt it would really bring the community together to have a real, working, city. It's something that really hasn't been done, and we can make it aesthetically pleasing at the same time, even though we'll have a lot of room for players.

Our 3rd solution is close to my heart. As a hardcore gamer, I've really taken to unique items for my character, and having my own personal home would be amazing. Sure, there's a level of uniqueness that comes along with a home within Sanctuary, but what if I want something that no one else on my server has?

There are a number of houses available outside of major cities, and available for purchase. Some of the "purchases" may not be straightforward, some may require tasks or quests, or maybe you just have to find the person with the key or the deed and physically take it from them. There are a million ideas, and it will really allow us to throw some unique pieces of life into the game, without saying "if you don't have this, you can't have anything". More options for a player is always better, I feel.

Also, there will be PvP-enabled "citadels" in our warzones. These castles and fortresses will have their own defenses, and give a guildleader all he could possibly want within. Want to beef the defense? Throw in some barracks (for more guards) or an armory. (for better equipped), or even a sentry cannon! Want to set up shop? Sure thing! Our thought process on these important structures is: Hard to take, Easy to defend. Like I just told Damon, if you want my Citadel you're going to pry it from my cold dead hands.

So I hope that gave you a little insight into how our thoughts work here at sRi, and hopefully shown you that Kaos War will have something for everyone in personal housing.

[a chewy rock]

Sounds pretty cool.

[Arion]

First of all, i'm really sorry to bump such a old topic :'(

Well, i played few games where housing were made fantastic in my opinion, u could invite u'r friends inside, u could use them as "show off" of all u'r fortune... etc.
We all know that problem with housing is when inactive people own that houses.
IMO there should be one fixed number of available houses on every server. Best way to regulate this is by paying monthly rents. So after 1 or 2 months if rent isn't paid that character simply looses control over house and someone else could rent it. Houses could even have different prices depending on their size, location , etc. And, instanced houses.... huh... i really don't see reason why they should exist, except in one case. That's if all houses would be placed in same instance, that would be really nice, and would be like some place to relax and chat and whatnot, simple relaxation of grinding ( doesn't matter that grinding "scale" isn't decided yet, there will be some doesn't matter what u want guys :o ).

Once again, i'm really sorry that i had to dig this topic out from nowhere ... but.... :mad:
Best regards.